1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a transceiver combination with a radio or tape recorder, and more particularly to a signal priority device activated in response to an audio output from the transceiver to disconnect a common speaker system from the output of a radio or tape recorder and connects the common speaker system to the audio output of the transceiver.
2. Prior Art
The rapid increase in the popularity and use of citizen band (C.B.) receivers in automotive vehicles has resulted for the most part in the user purchasing and installing a separate C.B. transceiver in the vehicle supplementing an existing radio receiver which had been previously installed at the factory or by the dealer at the time of the vehicle's purchase. Because the radio and C.B. transceiver are separate entities the operator is often faced with a delemma, he can either listen to the radio or the C.B. transceiver, but trying to do both simultaneously is extremely difficult. The near constant output of the radio or a tape recorder has a high probability of interferring with a message being received by the transceiver. This is particularly true if there is a vocal output from the radio; at the same time the message is being received by the transceiver. Effectively, this is the same as two people talking at the same time and it is difficult for a person to immediately "tune one off" and listen to the other. To avoid this problem, the vehicle operator either turns the radio "off" or turns the volume of the output from the radio much lower than the normal level when he wishes to use the transceiver.
The prior art teaches integrated radios and transceivers in which the output from the radio is turned "off" whenever a message is being received by the transceiver. Such integrated radio and transceiver systems are taught by I. Kobayashi in U.S. Pat. No. 3,277,374 (October, 1966) and K. Arai in U.S. Pat. No. 3,971,985 (July, 1976). The circuit arrangements taught by Kobayashi and Arai are only applicable to integrated radio and transceiver, and both use a common final audio output amplifier and speaker system.
However, as previously stated, the majority of vehicles equipped with C.B. transceivers do not have integrated systems and the radio receivers and C.B. transceivers are separate entities. To implement the circuits taught by either Kobayashi or Arai in the existing separate radio receivers and C.B. transceivers owned by these people would require rewiring and/or modification of the existing radio receiver or both the radio receiver and the C.B. transceiver. Most persons are not capable of making this type of modification themselves, and do not care to go through the expense or bother of having an experienced electronic technician do it for them.
The invention is a signal priority device in the form of an interrupter switch connected between the output of the radio receiver, the audio output of the ransceiver and a single common speaker system which may be either a single speaker or a speaker system as is common in many of the vehicles. The speaker system contemplated is normally the one associated with the vehicles radio receiver and/or tape recorder as the case may be. Hereinafter, the term "radio receiver" will include the possibility that the vehicle may also include a separate or integrated tape recorder as is common in many vehicles. There is no need to rewire or modify either the radio receiver or C.B. transceiver. All the interconnections are external to the separate entities and are sufficiently simple so that they can be performed by any person having no minimal electrical or electronic knowledge and skills. The inventive C.B. interrupter effectively performs the same functions as the integrated systems taught by Kobayashi and Arai without having to rewire or modify either component.